Family Night

It was dark now, but the coals still glowed with more than enough light enough to see by.  I held the child in my arms and tried to sing to it, but in my exhaustion I couldn't remember the words or the melodies to any children's songs.  The child grew fussy in my arms as I struggled with it, struggled with my idiot brain and got nowhere.  The child became upset and she - he - it, it began to wail and then to scream and twist in my arms.  I looked up to the stars, but I'm not sure for what.  Not prayer, certainly.  The child's screams turned into a thick barking cough and like a machine I sang the first two lines of 'Baa Baa Black Sheep' over and over and over again, silently begging the child to stop crying.  "Mother will come in the morning," I tried to whisper.  But my rough voice scared the child into even more frantic tears, and I went back to dully singing in my loveless, hopeless monotone.